


Dallyings of a Dalish

by alynshir



Series: she is my tomorrow [5]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Angst, Cute, Drabbles, F/F, Fluff, Fun, Lesbians, Romance, Second Person, thoughts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-23
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-10 03:08:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 2,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2008638
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alynshir/pseuds/alynshir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Little insights into the thoughts of one Solange Lavellan as she deals with a certain Seeker of the Chantry. A collection of drabbles in the second person.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hair

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own Dragon Age.

(1/?)

Her hair is soft. Much softer than you expected. Not that you were expecting anything, because did humans do that? Expect things to be one way? You think they might, because humans and elvhen are not so different, but you have no way to be positive. You suppose you could ask her, but that would probably be looked upon as odd.

 

Besides, you would much rather play with it than analyze it anyways, which is a rare occurrence. It is short and dark and soft like a baby fern, while you expected it to be rough like pine. She never seems to mind when you play with her hair. You wonder if that is a human thing too, but eventually you decipher that it is just her, because the bard reacted quite strongly when you asked to see the braid in her hair.

 

Humans are strange creatures. You like them though.

 

_tbc_


	2. Burning

Her eyes are much warmer than they were when you first met. You remember that day - the lightning, the explosions, the demons, darkness and pain and then firelight and the Seeker of the Chantry, who looked at you with eyes like chips of hard amber and a barely repressed snarl.

She disliked you back then, because of what the Fade did to you. Also, because you were a mage. But mostly because of the demon hand, which you have to cover with a glove because secretly it burns and it looks awful and you would rather blend in a bit more. She disliked you, and you didn't realize it because you never understood elvhen behavior well, let alone human behavior. You always brought her along on the missions the sweet diplomat girl always brought up, because the Seeker was strong, and because you couldn't understand why she wouldn't look you in the eye or why she would argue so much about your remedies for solutions - remedies involving magic.

Now the chips of amber look at you more openly. You and she are friends now, you think, and she does not look to your demon hand as much as she once did. You don't either - you find it is much less difficult to ignore the inner burn of it.

 

(The burn of your cheeks distracts you sufficiently.)

 

_tbc_


	3. Cyphers

The human language is very strange to write and read. What manner of cyphers did they use? You were so embarrassed the first time someone asked you to look at a paper - how silly and dumb you must have looked, a grown woman not knowing how to read a simple paper!

 

You remember asking the diplomat for help, but she had no time in her busy schedule to tutor an inconsequential thing - surely someone could just read things for you. The bard was so good at hiding when she didn’t want to be found, you didn’t bother to look, and the others were under the impression that you were “pulling their leg” or “yanking their chain”. (You have never tugged on any manner of chain in your life, much less one that someone owned, and pulling someone’s leg sounds rather painful.)

 

She believed you, though, she of all people and offered to teach you. She was reluctant then, and even you - the socially inept elf - knew she asked only out of courtesy and would not have done so had you been just an apostate and not the Inquisitor everyone deferred to.

 

She was so patient, though, and taught you out of a thick book with a bare, broad chested man on the cover. You learned to read words like “love” and “strong” and “slick” and “thrust” and “wanton” and only after you grasped the basics of the human cyphers did you realize just what she had been teaching you out of. You remember stuttering your words with a cherry red face the day you pieced it together, and the next day she brought you a different book with words like “cat” and “bat” and “my name is”.

 

You saw her smile that day. It was a guilty, self aware smile, but nevertheless a smile. You liked that day.

 

_tbc_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you ever would like to see something specific within this drabble collection between Solange and whomever, feel free to prompt me on tumblr @ onceuponakatie, or leave a comment with your idea. I hope you all are enjoying this as much as I am :)


	4. Words

Once you get past the harsh shell, the Seeker is a skilled conversationalist. Nobody would have thought (or at least, you wouldn’t have thought) she could carry a conversation so well, but she did. You and her (and the other elf as well) had a rollicking conversation about fighting - she defending the sword and Sera rooting for the bow and you advocating for magic. Her eyes were sparkling and she argued every point like a champion - like the one in the handwritten tome with the drawings of the apostate with blue eyes and a lady pirate that you found in her bookshelf once. (It has a stab mark through half of it. You wonder why.)

 

You think it was more fun to watch her talk than to win the argument for yourself, and later after a few tankards of the odd delicious stuff Sera calls “mead” you faintly remember someone hoisting you over their shoulder and hearing Sera say something about how ‘the googly eyes were downright sappy’. You aren’t quite sure what either googly eyes or sappy means, but your headache in the morning made you forget about the phrase quickly.

_tbc_


	5. Custom

Her lips are soft too. You found this out at the Orlesian ball - of course there was no tryst or intense admission of love that seems to happen in all of the books you have been given by Varric. It was just a custom for a majority of the people in attendance - so everyone did it. A little press of the lips to the cheek as you greet someone and as you bid them farewell.

Humans were odd, and you find yourself disliking the custom greatly. Why kiss on the cheek when there is a forehead, or a mouth? Foreheads are for children to be kissed by their parents and brothers and sisters, but mouths...they are vacant, are they not? Orlesian customs confuse you and frustrate you and give you a little pit of burning irritability low in your stomach, but you did get one good thing out of the evening: she may not have said too much about it, but you saw her eyes widen when you entered the ball with Josephine announcing her as "Madame Inquisitor Solange Lavellan, Craftsmaster and Enchanter of the Dales".

A fancy title and a fancy dress - too much for your tastes, but if you get _that_ reaction from her when you wear things like this, maybe you might do it more often. To wear things that make it a bit harder to breathe, but accentuate your chest and minimize your waist... Another odd human tradition, but you didn't mind seeing the other women wear them that evening either.

_tbc_


	6. Laughter

 

Her laughter is your favorite thing to hear, you decide. It is a rare thing, but on occasion something you do or say will coax a little chuckle (or Creators save you, a giggle) from the Seeker. Usually it is when you do something ridiculous like ask a merchant whether the bee nest under his stall is available for purchase (you did not realize humans do not sell bees! It feels like a missed opportunity to you) or when you try to walk in the 'heels' Vivienne-of-Iron loaned you to practice "being civilized" in public (you fell a lot. Most of the time it was on top of people).

 

The first time she laughed at you, but then you laughed too and everything seemed alright.

 

You twisted your ankle that day, trying to walk in Vivienne's torture devices, but it was okay because the large qunari who you have a sisterly fondness for carried you home atop his shoulders and you could see the entire world from up there, and you and he and she returned home to the Keep all smiling - she because of you and you because of she. And Bull smiled because of the mayhem that happened earlier in the tavern.

 

(It aches a bit to feel like a sister again after what happened to your brother, but this time you know Iron Bull will not be brought down as easily as your brother had been. No illness could vanquish him.)

 

_tbc_


	7. Monsters

When you start having the nightmares, she is the second to come running. 

The first person is Josephine, sweet, dear Josephine, with her meticulous and pretty hair down and braided in two like a little girl's instead of a politician's and her shrewd eyes wide and worried. You could not shake the horrible visions of demons and Blights past and death from your eyes no matter what kind words she whispered, and your screams and sobs continued until the Seeker appeared, half of her armor hastily thrown on and demanding to know what had happened. The sight of her, reliable and strong and ready to face any beast who dared enter, captured your full attention and as she drew closer and her gaze flew around the room searching for a threat, your cries dwindled and then after a little while everyone could go back to sleep. 

She didn't, though. She stayed at what you think might have been the request of the ever-observant diplomat, and sat with her back against the side of your bed and her sword stretched across the tops of her knees.

Since then, you always try to finish the blood mages you encounter before she can even see them, because you've seen the look in her eyes when blood magic comes about. You don't know what caused her the pained, angered flicker of fear you spy, but it's an expression you hate to see. In your mind, she can scare your monsters away so why can't you scare hers too?

tbc


	8. Secrets

When the kind Sister Nightingale who has too many scars for such a gentle bird asks you about your relationship with the Seeker, you are tentative as to your answer. You hesitate in your response. The sister smiles slightly, her blue eyes twinkling, and she says that “You two are well together. A good pair.”

 

You are not sure exactly what she is implicating - one thing you have learned about the shemlen is that a lot of the things they say are open to interpretation. Does she mean you work well together? That you are good friends? That you are a pair and are together like the characters in the books are? 

 

It must have shown on your face because Sister Leliana giggles and tells you she meant simply that you are compatible souls, that you get along well. She says that if you wish to ever tell her anything that may be awkward, she will keep the words under lock and key.

 

You trust both Hands of the Divine wholeheartedly - one with your life and one with your secrets - and it feels like you have something to say but you just can’t summon the proper words to your throat so you just swallow them and let them rot in your nervous stomach and choke out that you have no secrets worth telling.

tbc


	9. Cold

Her hands are callused and rough, but her grip on your shoulder belies that when she shakes you awake in the middle of the night for watch. The Anderfels are freezing and treacherous and you slept poorly, so you were glad to be free from dazed dreams of the murky Fade. She retreats to her tent and you bypass the seat near the campfire where you are supposed to go and instead sit on the jagged edge of the cliff, your legs dangling and your teeth chattering. You can see a storm brewing - below you, because your mountain is so high - but above and beyond stretches the sky, so open and clear and you couldn't count the diamonds that make up the stars. 

The wind whips at your cheeks and tosses your hair like it would a rag doll and you think maybe its frigidity will ease the aching smolder in your demon touched hand. You remove your gauntlet and let the leather and buckles drop to the snow dusted ground beside you, and nearly cry out at the sight of your once useful, healthy, hand now cracked and charred from the inside. It is shining with ugly green veins and the inflammation shines like red through black cloth. You shove the gauntlet back on and tear up as the harsh leather slams onto your skin.

You must have fallen asleep there, because you wake up in your tent with someone else's blanket, smelling of smoke and fresh cotton and a touch of timid honeysuckle, tucked over your shoulders, and with a dusting of frost on your lips. 

tbc


	10. Curiosity

She’s curious. It is almost funny to watch her, actually, to watch her experience strange new things. Her eyes - almond shaped and usually very suspicious - will widen and she will have lost all of her bravado and stand awkwardly in her armor. You think she resembles a young, adorable halla, and her cheeks get darker when you make the comparison.

You wonder if this is what you look like when you get lost in the sea of politics and people.

She’s curious on that moonless night when you two end up separated from the group and you navigate them back to the keep so very easily. She had crashed into trees and tripped over everything rather consistently - you had laughed each time and helped her up - and you had darted around them so easily. Why was that?

You explain to her that you have eyes like that of a cat and can see perfectly fine in the dark, and to say that she turns green and red with the envy of poison ivy…an exaggeration, she didn’t turn any manner of green, but as everyone has explained to you, it is an expression - a metaphor, they called it.


	11. Rain

The rain has been pouring incessantly - ‘raining cats and dogs’, Sera had said, although you don’t see any animals falling from the sky. Another metaphor, maybe? You aren’t sure. You are sure, however, that this constant simmering in your belly only gets worse thanks to this rain and those fighters who seem to think sparring in the rain is a good idea. 

Of course, they don’t know what you know - about how the rain and cold will weaken them and make illness easier to catch - but they do know how to get completely soaked and make it look like something out of one of Varric’s books, the ones with the content that Sera is thrilled to see you reading. 

Damn you and your stupid stomach simmers, and the stupidness of dark, drenched hair plastered to flushed, cold-nipped cheeks, and damn damn damn the half playful shoulder-shove motion she does towards Bull, whose horns shine proudly with rain. That motion! That little half smile! That barely there chuckle that nobody save you paid attention enough to hear! Her amber ice eyes are melting and sparking with adrenaline and rare fun - you’ve never seen anything so wonderful. You’ve never seen her like this, never ever ever. It makes your stomach burn inside even deeper. You can’t look away. 

You should go do something in your study. 

With the door locked.

Something productive.

For science.

(You said that out loud, apparently - Sera thinks it’s hysterical. You only meant to go look up the source of this stomach burning. What else would you be doing?)


	12. Sleep

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This part of DoaD is dedicated to tumblr user @genderqueerfenris and their amazing snow pixie self.

She sleeps. You think maybe when she is asleep, that is the only time when her face isn't creased with worry or anger or suspicion. Sometimes despite her best efforts, she slips into a doze while you two are on watch, and then you see her forehead smooth and her shoulders sag and her lips unpurse. In that time, when it is you and a sleeping warrior against the entire world, you think she looks like a child, a little girl who has put on her mother's armor to play make-believe, and you wonder how this person could ever hurt a fly.

You think in these times that she is the epitome of serenity, of order and calm - she does not move, she does not snore, she does not speak. She only breathes. Other times, however, You think she is the spirit of chaos, with sword flashing and eyes blazing like the sun. That is not now.

She falls asleep everywhere. And when you say everywhere, you mean _everywhere._ One would think she slept through the night, and never otherwise - with such a rigid nature, you and everyone else thought she would be early to rise, early to sleep.

Not her.

No, you have found her asleep in her study with her head supported in her hands, slumped over in the dining hall with her face buried in her arms, even in the library surrounded by copious tomes on swordplay and a few slim novellas with bawdy covers, her sharp face marked with the corners of the books she uses as a pillow. She never sleeps for long, though, and you have come to notice the bags under her amber eyes and the exhaustion in her stressed stance.

It twists your stomach that you are supposed to be the figurehead of this endeavor, and you get all the credit, yet you sleep through the night while she does not.

The Seeker stays up until morning watercolor paints her desk with pastels, until every single failed strategy swims in front of her eyes in constellations made of corpses, and all you can do is sit there on the nights she accidentally falls asleep on watch, and protect her like she does all of you.

**Author's Note:**

> This will be added onto :)
> 
> Leave me a comment telling me what you think!


End file.
